Final Fixes Reborn

[Nor'easter]

No, i got that, don't worry. It's just that if i start looking at adding some old events,i might as well start by looking at suggestions from people who are still around to be able to discuss them. (discussing ideas and designs is a major part of my work process )

I think most of the events I proposed had no prereqs, since I remember Kael saying that he mainly needed events to make the early game more interesting, so no or few prereqs would be best. They had various inspirations -- news stories, episodes of favorite TV shows, some LOTR. A few had simple prereqs, e.g., a unit on a water tile. I remember proposing a few events related to Iras, which of course wouldn't happen until the late game when those units appear. And I had some related to lair exploration that I thought were particularly creative, since they involved time travel and parallel universes. Again, whatever you end up deciding -- as I said, I had fun thinking them up, even if none of them makes it into the mod.

Separately, I went back to the post where I initially proposed Healer names and quotes and cleaned up a few typos (mainly missing apostrophes) in some of the suggested quotes, in case you do end up using any of them.

 

[Pilot Krystal]

Any chance of revamping the Sheaim a bit? Their game is very lackluster and they feel very weak compared to civs that have better units and/or production like, Illians, Lanun, Mechanos, Khazad, Mazatl, Legion etc.

How about adding 1F/1P per broken lands / burning sands for the Sheaim. It'd give them the incentive to get the AC up so they can prosper while others suffer the negatives. Because at the moment infernals are just better than Sheiam in every level

 

[black_imperator]

I don't have my notes on hand but there are currently a few paths of upgrades for the Sheaim :

Short-term : A few new summons (the bestiary of Erebus by Kael has some good candidates, i think the colubra is already in Magister Modmod for example) and maybe a set of defensive melee units (for those, i'm thinking of the women that Gabella takes at birth and raises as her own children that serve as her personal attendants and personal guard. There are a few good pieces of text about those in the lore forum, cannot find them at this point but i'll put a link tonight)

Middle-term : With the Guild/Cult Rework, the Sheaim would be the de facto origin of the Emrys Cult. It would give them better mages with unique spells getting stronger with AC, (and a way to corrupt mages from other civs)

Long-term ( by which i mean i've only started to think about it, it might happen tomorrow if the idea forms ) : I feel like the Ritualist part of the civilization isn't appearing enough ingame. Some new unique rituals with various effects (One could be as you suggest a ritual adapting them to Hell Terrain and giving them maluses on normal terrain, allowing the civ to be more adaptive).

 

[Joey Diamond]

Guild/Cult rework? WOW So there'll be something like corporations in this game?

And isn't the female child Os-Gabella stolen Alexis of Calabim? I haven't read much about Os-Gabella though.

Question. Is it possible to create a unique deplomatic agreement option for each civ that doesn't involve the usual resource/gold/cities/units/tech? (but still be able to use those resources for the exchange purpose)

For example:

Sheaim: Arcane Research Alliance. the Sheaim send a team of their researchers to aid the civ that entered the agreement. The partner civ receive boosts to research on ALL techs while the Sheaim receive LARGE boosts to research on techs that their partner already discovered.

Hippus: Mercenary Service. For 30 turns, a single copy of ALL Hippus cavalry units(Including magnadine) will appear at the capital of the civ in agreement and can be use like their own units with no upkeep cost. During this period, Both party in agreement cannot attack each other (for 30 turns instead of the usual 10 turns) And All original(The ones that got copied) Hippus cavalry units will receive a held/leashed/no movement debuff, preventing them from moving. When the agreement expires, remove all copied units from play and transfered their experience and HP back to the original units. If a copy unit died, the original unit will be instantly released from held debuff with 0.1 HP and "Mortally wounded" debuff: -80% heal rate, removed when fuly healed.

Lanun: Privateer Corps. Same as Hippus but with Ships and boarding party units (including Guybrush Threepwood) copy privateer had "Hidden Nationality" promotion temporary removed to prevent sending it back to attack the original units

 

[black_imperator]

Guild/Cult rework? WOW So there'll be something like corporations in this game?

There actually already are some "corporations" but the current ones are very basic and not linked to any other mechanic or lore. I really don't like them, so i'm gonna cut them as soon as i have a bit of time. After that, there is a potential rework planned by introducing guilds and cults with more options and interactions and that actually come from some lore(some examples of cults could be The Emrys, The Stewards of Inequity, The Unblemished; The Saperes, The Foxmen, the Occis,.....)

And isn't the female child Os-Gabella stolen Alexis of Calabim? I haven't read much about Os-Gabella though.

The first one yeah, but there's a story somewhere in the lore forum that Gabella, once she started leading the Sheaim in the age of Rebirth (way after Alexis and Flauros), took girls from their families at a young age and raised them herself. The girls saw her as their Queen and Mother and were completely devoted to her.

Question. Is it possible to create a unique deplomatic agreement option for each civ that doesn't involve the usual resource/gold/cities/units/tech? (but still be able to use those resources for the exchange purpose)

For example:

Sheaim: Arcane Research Alliance. the Sheaim send a team of their researchers to aid the civ that entered the agreement. The partner civ receive boosts to research on ALL techs while the Sheaim receive LARGE boosts to research on techs that their partner already discovered.

Hippus: Mercenary Service. For 30 turns, a single copy of ALL Hippus cavalry units(Including magnadine) will appear at the capital of the civ in agreement and can be use like their own units with no upkeep cost. During this period, Both party in agreement cannot attack each other (for 30 turns instead of the usual 10 turns) And All original(The ones that got copied) Hippus cavalry units will receive a held/leashed/no movement debuff, preventing them from moving. When the agreement expires, remove all copied units from play and transfered their experience and HP back to the original units. If a copy unit died, the original unit will be instantly released from held debuff with 0.1 HP and "Mortally wounded" debuff: -80% heal rate, removed when fuly healed.

Lanun: Privateer Corps. Same as Hippus but with Ships and boarding party units (including Guybrush Threepwood) copy privateer had "Hidden Nationality" promotion temporary removed to prevent sending it back to attack the original units

Possible, yeah but pretty complicated and extremely difficult to balance. The Hippus thing does double with the current mercenary system, allowing the hippus to put some of their units available for mercenary work.

 

[Pilot Krystal]

There actually already are some "corporations" but the current ones are very basic and not linked to any other mechanic or lore. I really don't like them, so i'm gonna cut them as soon as i have a bit of time. After that, there is a potential rework planned by introducing guilds and cults with more options and interactions and that actually come from some lore(some examples of cults could be The Emrys, The Stewards of Inequity, The Unblemished; The Saperes, The Foxmen, the Occis,.....)

The first one yeah, but there's a story somewhere in the lore forum that Gabella, once she started leading the Sheaim in the age of Rebirth (way after Alexis and Flauros), took girls from their families at a young age and raised them herself. The girls saw her as their Queen and Mother and were completely devoted to her.

Possible, yeah but pretty complicated and extremely difficult to balance. The Hippus thing does double with the current mercenary system, allowing the hippus to put some of their units available for mercenary work.

I went around MoM a bit and their take on the guilds and Sheiam are rather good. Whether you can or cannot make such work in AoE. Well would require some overhaul. But crudely Sheiam just have tools to increase AC and don't suffer from it themselves, vice versa

 

[black_imperator]

i'm not too fond of some ofthe things MoM has done to be honest, so i'm unlikely to go find inspiration there. I've outlined the general plan for the Sheaim in my earlier post. I do take suggestions though ^^

To elaborate, it doesn't make much sense in my opinion to give them native bonuses to Hell terrain, as they are still human and leaving in Erebus at Game Start ( Contrary to the Infernals who are Demons), but them gaining it through rituals make sense and make for good gameplay, i think.

 

[Joey Diamond]

To elaborate, it doesn't make much sense in my opinion to give them native bonuses to Hell terrain, as they are still human and leaving in Erebus at Game Start ( Contrary to the Infernals who are Demons), but them gaining it through rituals make sense and make for good gameplay, i think.

Nice idea!, make it so that they gradually trade off their 'human' bonus for their 'demonic' equivalent with every rituals completed. Kinda like the Sheaim slowly losing their souls and human moralities.

Actually, the ritual system i think is one of the best underused system. And almost all the good one were preserved for the Illians. Adding some more for the Sheaim, the Amurites, other arcane-centric nations or even rituals for any nations would be a nice addition.

Some of my idea for low level rituals. These are Rituals that requires little production to complete but also has low effect compared to other 'game changing' rituals.

-Mass Bless(name pending): Unlocked at Priesthood. cost 200 Double production speed with Law mana and Sun mana. Can be cast multiple times.

Add Blessed promotion to 10 random legible units in the caster's civ. It's a kinda nifty ritual when preparing for the apocalypse. Plus, the Blessed promotion will be remove after combat so i think it doesn't seems to overpowered much.

-Mass Regeneration(name pending): Unlocked at Alteration. cost 200 Double production speed with Body mana. Can be cast multiple times

Add Regeneration promotion to 10 random wounded units in the caster's civ.

-Sooth the souls: Unlocked at Knowledge of the Ether. cost 300 Double production speed with Mind mana and Spirit mana. Can be cast multiple times.

Remove all negative mind effect(crazed, enraged etc.) from 2 random afflicted units per ritual. I absolutely despised these uncurable mental sickness especially at the start of the game. I know dungeon delving was supposed to be a gamble but atleast give us some way to remove these malus, even if we have to waste alot of time completing the ritual to cure only one or two units.

-Nature's bounties: Unlocked at Animal Handling. cost 400 Double production speed with Life mana and Nature mana. Can be cast multiple times.

Greatly increase animals spawn rate and instantly spawn more animal lairs on the map for 30 turns. Stack with Double animals spawn option. I loves animal in FFH and wished there was more ways to play with them or find some way to use them to affect or deter our rivals.

-Natural Cycle: Unlocked at Animal Handling. cost 300 Double production speed with Life mana and Nature mana. Can only be cast while Nature's bounties is active.

Revert animals spawn rate from Nature's Bounties back to normal

Oh and can i get a confirm again about Acheron the Red Dragon, whether she was able to move or not? I vaguely remembered the answer in this thread that she's supposed to be leashed and cannot move at all. But in my hot seat session with my friend Acheron has about 5 leash range and decimate my friend's axemen far away from the dragon's city. This time i didn't use any outdated modules.

 

[Nor'easter]

I've never played as the Infernals, so can't speak about them, but the Sheaim certainly do benefit from raising the AC: increased rate of creatures spawning through the Planar Gates, plus the spawned creatures starting with more XP as the AC goes up. And since so many of their units are either Undead or Demons, they can weather Armageddon when the AC hits 100. That's why they have the Elegy of the Sheaim to help them raise the AC.

I think they're kind of fun as is, but @black_imperator, those ideas of yours look good.

Since they start at peace with the Demons, it would be interesting if they could conduct diplomacy with Agares, if that's even possible to program. (If you did that, then in parallel you'd have to allow civs that start at peace with the Animal Packs to conduct diplomacy with Cernunnos, and those that start at peace with the Orc/Goblin/etc. Barbarians to engage in diplomacy with Bhall. Probably too complex to program, although might add some interesting flavor.)

 

[jackelgull]

I got a new computer and redownloaded this game but it isn't working for some reason? Like I can get the menu to come up, but when I try to launch the game it doesn't launch and when I try to access the game through advanced options, load mod, it just leads me to something that calls itself the mod, but has all the standard bts leaders and civs.

 

[black_imperator]

Sounds like your folder is misplaced., Should be Beyond the Sword/Mods/Ashes of Erebus/Assets

As for Acheron, he gets a random leash of 1-5 tiles when he spawns.

And for the Diplomacy with Barbs, that would be possible but probably too much work for it would offer. Rituals and spells could give similar flavors

 

[jackelgull]

Ashes of Erebus is within another folder called Ashes of Erebus 14.11 should I take it out of that folder? And which mod folder should ashes of erebus be in? There are two, one in my games, and one in program files 86 > 2K games

 

[black_imperator]

the one in program files, and yeah you should take it out of the 14.11 folder.

 

[Nor'easter]

And for the Diplomacy with Barbs, that would be possible but probably too much work for it would offer. Rituals and spells could give similar flavors

The more I think about it, I suppose the main benefit of Diplomacy with Barbs would involve trade: trade routes, resource trading, tech trading. If you're at peace with a particular Barb faction, then de facto you already have a military quasi-alliance with them against any civ with whom you happen to be at war. And you have something kind of like Open Borders but without trade routes, since your units can traverse that Barb faction's territory.

So maybe something that allows trade routes with cities belonging to a Barb faction with whom you're at peace? Can't really think of anything else -- I think trying to program in a ritual or spell that allows resource or tech trading with a particular Barb faction might be too complicated.

 

[black_imperator]

The trade route thing may actually be possible. Though since only Bhall barbs have cities, it won't make much of a mechanic for the others.

 

[Nor'easter]

Well I do occasionally see notifications that a city has been captured by the Animal Packs, which I guess is Cernunnos, although I don't remember if they keep the city or raze it. Don't remember if Agares captures cities and, if so, whether he razes or keeps them.

 

[black_imperator]

they both automatically raze them. There was some kind of issue with allowing more than one barb to control cities. I can't remember what it was right now but i'll check

 

[Joey Diamond]

Question: was it hard to change special gears from Great Engineer's master buildings from just promotions into actual chest item?

I take it that it would be too OP if a scout was able to pick up melee-only plate mail (+1 attack & defence) but maybe you could allow only a specific unit type to pick up their class items.

 

[black_imperator]

you just have to put the <bEquipment>1</bEquipment> tag in the xml of the promotion you want to turn into an equipment. I'm not sure i'll actually do it though, for balance concern as you mentioned

 

[Nor'easter]

@black_imperator , I'm not particularly fixated on trade with Barbs (trade routes, tech trading, resource trading), it was just something that occurred to me that I thought might add something different for those factions.